BATON ROUGE - Les Miles' first head tilting postgame press conference this season was not after the Ole Miss game on Nov. 17. He made some curious comments after losing 21-17 to No. 1 Alabama on Nov. 3.

The LSU coach was miffed that seemingly no one had picked his team to beat the Crimson Tide in Tiger Stadium. Actually, I picked the Tigers to win that game, but he was talking national prognosticators. And he was basically right. At the time, though, I thought he was a little too incredulous in his comments, particularly since he had just done what most said would happen. He lost to Alabama.

"The idea that people would sit there and discount this football team before they even played the game is just unbelievable," he said. "The idea that someone could pick somebody else."

Uh, Les, you did just lose the game, and Alabama was No. 1 at the time, undefeated, and was a two-touchdown favorite. And you did just lose to them 21-0 in January basically at home. So it wasn't exactly a reach to pick Alabama.

It was about the first time I felt that a college coach sounded like a high school coach, who often get upset when their hometown paper doesn't pick them to win every game. Miles may think that everyone who covers LSU pulls for LSU, which is wrong.

But four weeks after Alabama's fortunate win over LSU as the Crimson Tide enters the Southeastern Conference Championship Game with Georgia today in Atlanta, I thoroughly understand what Miles meant.

Miles was incredulous because he felt the world had "Bama on the Brain." I did not realize this until after Texas A&M defeated Alabama 29-24 on Nov. 10 at Alabama by putting up 418 yards on the nation's No. 1 defense and watching the Tide self-destruct in the fourth quarter. A&M, a SEC newbie, beat Alabama 9-7 in the fourth quarter as the Tide suffered two turnovers, including an interception on an underthrown ball by quarterback A.J. McCarron that lost the game and the Heisman. Alabama never has two turnovers in the fourth quarter.

If you looked at the polls since that game and the latest polls today, it is as if Alabama beat A&M 29-24 that November afternoon, however. The Tide, 11-1 with that loss just three weeks ago, is No. 2 in every poll. A&M, 10-2 with one loss in September and one in October, is No. 8 at best. Not in my Associated Press poll. I may be the only person in America that has A&M No. 4 and Alabama No. 5.

A&M did put up 418 yards on Alabama just three weeks ago at Alabama, which is still No. 1 in the nation in total defense with 233 yards allowed a game. LSU, by the way, put up 435 against Alabama.

Do you get the feeling maybe Alabama's statistics and win total have been padded by playing a weak schedule? Because of how SEC scheduling fell this year, the Tide had the unique fortune of not playing the three best SEC East teams - No. 3 Georgia (11-1), No. 4 Florida (11-1) and No. 10 South Carolina (10-2). Alabama's schedule, by the way, is fourth from the bottom in the SEC difficulty, according to the NCAA's schedule ranking, behind Florida, Missouri, Kentucky, Arkansas, Auburn, Texas A&M, South Carolina, LSU, Ole Miss and Tennessee and 29th in the nation.

Georgia's schedule is 60th as it also got out of playing three of the West's best teams in the regular season - Texas A&M, Alabama and LSU. But on Oct. 27, Georgia beat Florida, which beat No. 8 A&M, No. 7 LSU and No. 12 Florida State. Alabama has exactly one win over the top 18 teams in the BCS, which came at LSU. It has played two above average teams all season - LSU and A&M. It lost one and was lucky to win the other one, according to its coach.

Nick Saban compared his win over LSU this season to LSU's "Bluegrass Miracle" win over Kentucky in 2002 when he was LSU's coach. Saban knows he was lucky to win that game. He knew he was done had Miles let Zach Mettenberger throw one more pass. Yet there Alabama is at No. 2 everywhere.

I understood this last season. Alabama didn't have a lot of impressive wins last year either, but its only loss was to the No. 1 team - LSU - in overtime by three points in a game in which it outgained the Tigers. This year it has beaten one high quality opponent and did it with good fortune and lost to a two-loss, 15th-ranked team. It didn't lose to an undefeated team this year.

Alabama is where it is because of reputation voting. Too many voters are still seeing last year's national champion Alabama team. They have failed to notice how average its defense played against its only two decent opponents - LSU and A&M. They have failed to realize that Alabama lost seven starters from its defense last season.

Most everyone is assuming Alabama is that good because it was last year and just a few years ago in 2009 when it won the national title. National media, in particular, love labels and brand names because they make their job easier. Alabama is a safe pick when assuming things. And it has looked very good and beaten some very bad opponents handily. But all those statistics were fool's gold when Bama played LSU and A&M.

And there will be fool's gold on display today in the Georgia Dome when Georgia quarterback Aaron Murray does what Johnny Manziel and Zach Mettenberger did before him. He will shred Alabama's defense, particulary that porous secondary.

SEC TITLE GAME PREDICTION: Georgia 34, Alabama 31. And I won't have to change my Associated Press poll at all as I already have Notre Dame at No. 1, followed by No. 2 Georgia, No. 3 Florida, No. 4 Texas A&M and No. 5 Alabama. A&M and Alabama will each have two losses on Sunday, and since A&M did actually beat Alabama at Alabama just three weeks ago, anyone who does not vote A&M over Alabama is a fool.